


Two Transitions

by ApollonDeuxMille



Series: From Here To There [1]
Category: Les Misérables (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Character Deconstruction, Eventual Enjolras/Grantaire, Eventual Ship Deconstruction (laterrrr), First Meetings, Gen, Hatred, Reconciliation, University, friendships, personal struggles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-13
Updated: 2014-04-13
Packaged: 2018-01-19 07:11:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1460458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApollonDeuxMille/pseuds/ApollonDeuxMille
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Grantaire swooped down, hissing as a savage urge entered him, and he stubbed out his cigarette on the nearest expanse of skin. Enjolras howled and kicked as his flushed cheekbone sizzled."</p><p>Grantaire, a struggling university student, tries to lift himself from stagnation, recalls the day he made a nemesis out of Enjolras, and somehow manages to create the beginnings of a change he isn't sure he even meant to initiate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two Transitions

**Author's Note:**

> A little word vomit from me to you. I've put this down as the debut act of a series that may or may not ever expand, but considering the way I've written fanfiction over the last twelve years or so, several more one-shots and a couple of multi-chapter efforts are likely to come into being, all in relation to each other in terms of events and time-line. So keep your peepers peeping, just in case.
> 
> Feedback is the food of creative expansion and improvement. Hint hint.

Grantaire has finally admitted to himself that he is struggling. This has been the case since the start and now in the shadow of impending deadlines he can no longer deny that his position of floundering will become a position of sinking. Taking his sour fortune into consideration, he drums his fingers madly when he realises the remarkable haste with which this transition will occur. He has only the weekend left before the most enormous of his deadlines thus far. There is yet a pitch outlining his final year stratagem to construct, a script to be written for the accompanying presentation which must be executed before his head lecturer and the rest of his year group. An insufferable impulse to leap into the chasm of failure that he must quell.

Once there had been a great passion within Grantaire, held readily in his hand so as to find somewhere suitable to put it down and let it grow. Now his own hand closes around it, his fingernails dig in and he smothers it inside a fist he hadn't realised he'd begun to clench. Grantaire's great passion was simply to create; messily, meticulously, massively or minutely, his adaptable artistic talent was boundless. How excited he was to finally move out! To wallow in the daydreams of what he expected university and independence to be like! Only student life fell upon him like a heavy cloak, suffocating and unexpectedly dark. He manages to find delightful trinkets in the numerous pockets of this cloak wrapped around him, a friend here, an opportunity there, but there's no way out, no way to see where to go. Grantaire is exhausted to the marrow, and quite lost by now.

'My sweet friend,' Jehan begins, as he and Grantaire amble to to a sandwich shop for a cheap lunch. ‘We just don’t create the same way. All I have to do when I get a block is go for a walk by myself, or Google photos of flowers –’

Grantaire makes an ugly noise of frustration at this, pushing through the sandwich shop door with unnecessary force. He scowls furiously at the blackboard menu, as if it details a remedy for the melancholy occupying his mind. ‘But Jehan,’ – he stops to quickly order a panini – ‘I don’t have a block, I literally just don’t care anymore. It’s not in me. I don’t eat, sleep, or breath this fucking art stuff anymore.’

Jehan also orders, then turns to Grantaire who watches absently as the food they have ordered is prepared. He sees his friend is gnawing at the inside of his cheek, a persistent misery quivering along his thick brows. ‘All I can suggest, Grantaire, is thinking of something you do care about. Something you’re really passionate about, and just make your project about that. Just to get you through your final year.’

Grantaire sniffs, mulls over the words, cracks his knuckles. _‘Just to get me through my final year…'_ he repeats quietly. 'That’s the thing though. I’m pitching my Final Major Project. This really does have to be something I’ll care enough about for the whole of my final year.’ His stubbled face falls into a wistful, aimless gaze. ‘I don’t think I care about anything that much, Jehan.’

Jehan’s eyes are pained and his voice is sad, ‘I’m sorry, Grantaire. That you feel like this. I’m sure you do care about something…’ He snuffles at the shoulder of Grantaire’s pleather jacket and makes his favourite silly face. ‘At least, I _hope_ you care about something... you know, like _me.’_

Grantaire chuckles and he inclines his head to bump temples with Jehan. ‘Of course I care about _you_ , Jehan.’

‘Great, then you can do your major project about me!’

Grantaire's laughter is a smoke-crackled bark. ‘That would be great, pastel coloured roses all over _everything.'_

Jehan pokes him in the ribs. ‘Don't forget paisley patterns and ducks!’

‘Ducks?’

‘I like feeding ducks. At the lake.’

Grantaire gives Jehan a quirky frown. ‘And this is why we love you,’ he says. ‘But seriously, I’m going to need to do some long, hard thinking if I’m going to come up with something.’

‘Well my curly friend, let’s talk about it on the way back to mine. We’ve both finished lectures for the day and Feuilly always makes a fabulous pasta bake on Friday nights.’ 

* * *

 

The reason Feuilly’s pasta bake is labelled _fabulous_ is because Jehan is not a particularly skilled chef. He struggles even with cheese on toast and if the packaging only displays cooking instructions for the oven and not the microwave as well, he will ignore it completely and suffer instant noodle dishes instead. Nevertheless, the simplicity of Feuilly's dish – twirly pasta shapes, sauce from a jar, tuna and a generous topping of cheese – is enough to have Grantaire stammering his thanks for being allowed to join in their meal.

Feuilly smiles. ‘It’s honestly okay, Grantaire. This meal is cheap as anything. When you’ve been grown up as long as me, which isn’t long, but whatever, you learn to find inexpensive meals that fill you up and you stick to them.’

Feuilly is not a student like Grantaire and Jehan, and is almost thirty years old, yet he continues to live with and socialise with students. Ceaselessly he insists on one excuse or the other; _it's because of the council tax discount_ or _it's just easier to find room mates,_ but just once he has admitted under the influence of spirits and weed that he enjoys the ease with which students form new friendships and is secretly a bit frightened of becoming _too grown up._ Grantaire cruelly thought that this was rather sad when he first heard it, though later reprimanded himself, realising that the way Jehan copes with independence has improved since living with Feuilly. Jehan was not happy in the first year of university.

The room falls into a homely gait. The telly is droning but no one is watching, it's just there for comfort, the big back window is open and lets in a steady tempo of rainfall, and their cutlery chatters back and forth at each other.

‘Grantaire…? Are you okay?’

Grantaire has stilled, a cheekful of food forgotten, and his eyes gaze into an unseen distance. His defiant curls seem to react with a kind of electricity. He swallows and then speaks. ‘I think I've decided what to do my project on!’

His bowl finds a place by his crossed knees so he can strum his knobbly-knuckled fingers through his hair, as if coaxing his idea further into tangibility. Both Feuilly and Jehan are waiting for him to say it, but he is too deep into his bizarre hair-twirling habit. Feuilly absently licks his bowl.

‘Go on then,’ he says. ‘What’s the idea?’

Curiously, in contrast with the abrupt surge of energy, Grantaire curls into himself and looks a little pink in the face. His eyes are everywhere as he picks very deliberately at his shoelaces. ‘Well… it’s kind of… well I dunno. I was thinking about what I’ve been thinking about a lot recently’ – Jehan makes a face – ‘and me and the other illustration students were talking in the studio the other day about… about a thing. Like. One of them knows someone that had a baby. And we were talking about kids. And I was talking about how I really want to adopt –’

A breathy sound of excitement escapes from Jehan. ‘Grantaire, is that true? I never knew that!’

Grantaire nods, strangely shy about his revelation. Feuilly eyes him distantly, unreadable. ‘Yeah yeah… anyway we had a little debate, like they didn’t get it. I just – I just don’t understand making more babies when there are already loads with no families. I just don’t get it.’ He tugs at his collar. ‘It hurts my heart.’

He fiddles with his shoelaces again as Jehan claps and coos and spouts scenarios of Grantaire saving all the babies in the world. Feuilly’s crows-feet extend as he squints and rubs his jaw. ‘How are you going to turn that into a project? What will you make?’

Grantaire finally looks at Feuilly, his reserve still pinking his cheeks. ‘When we did our childrens’ book project in the first year, I bought some kids' books for research. I got one about adoption by accident – it’s a book that you’re meant to read with them after you’ve adopted them.’ Feuilly blinks. Grantaire chews his lip. ‘You know, to help them understand the transition. I thought maybe I could make one.’

Feuilly blinks again, his eyebrow flickers and suddenly his face splits into a very toothy and somewhat suspicious smile. Jehan is smiling too, and chimes in to vocalise the connection Feuilly has just made. ‘You haven’t been to any of the ABC meetings for a while, have you Grantaire.’

This makes Grantaire frown as he puzzles over the relevance of the comment. He comes up short and shrugs, gesturing for further explanation. Feuilly speaks up. ‘One of the debate threads running at the moment is the current state of the foster care system and the reform of the adoption process – ’

A nod from Jehan. ‘You’re obviously actually interested in this…’ he pauses to glance sidelong at Feuilly, both of their faces tinged with something mischievous, ‘…And wouldn’t it be great for you to actually smack the fact that you genuinely care about the current topic of debate in Enjolras’s face?’

It takes a few seconds for the penny to drop; they each can almost hear it tinkling around. Then Grantaire’s face fills up with an incredibly impish and vengeful grin. ‘You know,’ he begins, his posture changing completely, slouching into his familiar, confident and cocky skin, ‘That _would_ be great.’

* * *

 

Grantaire met Enjolras very early on in his university life. They encountered each other on the first night of the Freshers Week, when everyone who lived on campus had moved into their rooms, met those they’d be sharing their floor with, attended the fresher safety assembly (apparently trying to cook chicken nuggets in a toaster is very dangerous) and as the evening fell, charged the student bar to make new friends and begin the week-long club crawl that made Freshers Week a notoriously famed aspect of student life.

Although he was not apt at making new friends or even summoning the energy to pursue old friendships, Grantaire was excited about this week. He had seen university as an escape from the ever-stifling family home he’d been living in his whole life. He had an ill-tempered father who worked long hours in a job he hated, a sweet but histrionic mother who juggled raising her children with an abhorrent part-time night job at a 24-hour supermarket, and Grantaire himself was the third child out of six. And was the only boy. He explained this to his new friend Joly, who was living in the room next to him and with whom he'd immediately sparked up a conversation about the crusty condom plastered to the wall outside the window of Grantaire’s shower room. Not more than an hour into their acquaintance, after giving awkward goodbyes to the family members who had helped them move out of home and into their new lives, Joly was guffawing at every silly quip Grantaire made as they headed to the safety meeting.

‘ _Five_ sisters?’ Joly said, chortling into his knuckles. ‘Seriously? No wonder you decided to get out! Five _sisters!’_

‘Who has five sisters?’ A happy, twangy voice rang out behind them. It was the Irish boy from the top floor, who they’d bumped into several times as they went up and down the staircase with their belongings. Grantaire rolled his gaze around and fixed the Irishman with a withering look. ‘Only two of them are of a suitable courting age,’ he said, bringing more idiotic laughter from Joly and a tickled grin from the new guy, who introduced himself as Courfeyrac, ‘and all of them are as fuck ugly as me.’

At that a cascade of raucous laughter went with them the short way to the bottom of the stairwell, where they bumped into the inhabitants of the ground floor flat also getting ready to leave for the safety lecture and induction. A stormy pair of eyes glared up at the rowdy troupe from under a headful of curls that could rival Grantaire’s own curls. The face these eyes belonged to was fixed with a disapproving scowl, the brow deeply creased and the mouth set in an almost childish pout.

‘Enjolras!’

The scowling face flickered and the dark eyes shot up. A mouth full of impossibly straight, rather horse-like teeth came on display in a wide smile.

‘Combeferre! What are you doing here, I thought you were living in a student house in town?’

One of the more quiet members of the top floor group weaved through the bodies on the stairs and pulled Enjolras into a chaste but fond hug. ‘I got the transfer!’ he pulled back and grinned. ‘Someone withdrew their application to halls and I was first on the list to get offered their room! So I took it!’

‘And it’s in the same building as me!’ A fiery excitement rolled off Enjolras, his temperament, upon initial inspection by Grantaire, seemed to ignite in the company of a friend. He along with the others who were filing out of their block of halls smiled at the exchanges between the two friends, and on the way to the lecture hall where the talk was being hosted, they all commented on the phenomenon that the two friends had ended up living in the same building.

Later on, when apparently every single student who lived on campus had made their way to the student bar and the freshers barbeque, Grantaire staunchly glued himself to Joly’s side. His earlier jauntiness had subsided and the long day, which was filled with much more excitement than he was used to, had taken the wind from his sails. His selective confidence had escaped and he felt queasy at the thought of ploughing headfirst inside where there wasn’t even space to stick out an elbow.

‘Come on, funny man!’ Courfeyrac’s infuriatingly difficult accent bubbled over the sea of heads. He was heading inside to get a round of drinks. Grantaire could feel his insides squirming at the thought of being squashed into the crowd, but he wanted to make new friends and to impress them right off the mark. It was Joly’s absent-minded yet reassuring push from behind him that made him surge forward to get through to Courfeyrac’s side before he dived into the mayhem of the bar.

It took a lot of determination and the giving and receiving of apologies for standing on feet, stumbling into sides and elbowing ribs and boobs before they made it to the bar. The man working their end of the bar, who had short, tight curls and wiry arms, took a long time to make his way down to them. Courfeyrac gladly ordered and the fistful of cash he had taken off everyone he was ordering drinks for was clumsily handed over. The barman quickly set about pulling the five generic pints that had been ordered and Grantaire sighed, turning around to look at the madness he was going to have to carry the drinks through to make his way outside again.

He almost got a face full of blonde, wild hair. Enjolras, whose back was turned to him as he double-checked the drinks he would be ordering on behalf of his little group, much the same way Courfeyrac had done, was rammed up against Grantaire, surging with the crowd and pressing uncomfortably close. The intense heat of the room, coupled with the unreasonable amount of unwanted physical contact that was crushing in from all sides, was making Grantaire feel light-headed and quite ill. He felt his face go very cold. His vision began to shrink in on itself. It was at this moment that Enjolras turned back to face the bar. He and Grantaire were almost nose-to-nose.

‘What’s the matter?’ Enjolras had to shout over the excited din. ‘You’re very white.’

Grantaire tried to make words with his suddenly dry mouth. ‘I hate crowds.’

Enjolras gave him the kind of look a person would give to a dog that had accidentally rolled around in its own shit. ‘Then why the fuck did you come inside?’

Grantaire stared at him, stung, dithering for an answer better than ‘I want the new people to like me’. He was given a lucky alibi as Courfeyrac passed two pints into his shaking hands and ordered him to begin making his way outside.

It was dark before Grantaire saw Enjolras again. The bar was still packed and the outside was rammed with those who smoked. Grantaire had warmed greatly to Courfeyrac, who was sharing his pouch of tobacco. He listened to Joly and a twitchy fellow called Marius telling jokes about the fact they were both in rooms next to girls and were placing bets with each other as to who would first hear the tell-tale buzz of a vibrator.

Combeferre was suddenly there, edging his way to Courfeyrac to ask what time to order taxis to the nightclubs in town. It was not yet ten o’ clock and Courfeyrac told him, upon good faith of a friend in the year above, that the pulse of the student nightlife didn’t quicken until gone the magic hour of midnight. Enjolras, who had since shrugged on a plum-coloured jacket, which should have looked ridiculous but didn’t, snaked his way into the centrefold of the group. He was somehow always in the middle of things. Grantaire, still smarting from the rudeness he had suffered earlier, sucked deeply on his hand-rolled cigarette and refused to be pushed out of his spot in the main circle.

Enjolras spotted him and nodded. He turned to give Grantaire his direct attention. Grantaire eyed him with a cold wariness.

‘I’m sorry about earlier,’ Enjolras said. ‘You were on drink-duty like me, I guess.’

Grantaire said nothing, instead choosing to blow an entire lungful of smoke into his face. Enjolras made a disgusted face – obviously not a smoker – and turned away. Combeferre was staring, tight-lipped, he seemed set to interfere. Courfeyrac was giving him an amused yet bewildered look. The exchange had been missed by the others who were too engrossed in their respective merry-making.

‘What the actual fuck is your problem?’ Enjolras had emerged from the cloud of smoke, tense and blazing. This was where Combeferre uncoiled from his ready position and placed a hand on his shoulder.

‘You ought to learn some manners,’ Grantaire replied. His tone was frosty and even, but his hands were shaking and his heart was hammering wildly.

‘Manners? I just apologised to you!’ Enjolras had gone extremely red in the face and Grantaire realised that Combeferre was exerting a great deal of pressure to keep him from surging forward, his knuckles white where he clutched the silly plum jacket.

‘If you had any fucking manners you wouldn’t need to apologise in the first place, you raging thundercunt.’

Courfeyrac made a whooping noise of awed disbelief and Joly and Marius gasped, having just joined the situation. Enjolras’s face went impossibly dark. He snarled and lurched forward, breaking from Combeferre’s grip and landing his fist across Grantaire’s cheekbone. Grantaire came back from the blow and gave a spiteful kick to Enjolras’s shin before sharply putting his fist into his neck, sending him to the floor. Grantaire swooped down, hissing as a savage urge entered him, and he stubbed out his cigarette on the nearest expanse of skin. Enjolras howled and kicked as his flushed cheekbone sizzled. The brawl continued until Combeferre and Courfeyrac could peel them off each other.

* * *

 

That was how Grantaire and Enjolras first met. Now it is almost two years later and they have both struggled to reconcile their hatred for each other. Not long into the first semester of the first year, Enjolras, as part of one of his modules, had to propose the hypothetical formation of a political debate group, but of course he didn’t do just enough to pass his module, he actually set up a debate group, and called it The Friends of the ABC. It's supposed to be a pun on something French that Grantaire doesn't care about, and he was first to mock the ridiculous name. Much to his displeasure, the debate group managed to gain traction thanks to Enjolras’s passionate oratory skills and now has plenty of members.

Strangely Grantaire nearly always attends the ABC meetings. Despite the Freshers Brawl, as his spat with Enjolras has fondly been dubbed, his friendships haven’t suffered, and the only backlash has been a cold shoulder from Combeferre. He had later explained to Grantaire, ever the pragmatic creature that Combeferre is, how his fiery friend has always been somewhat of a slave to his quick temper so he was sure the blame was equally shareable between them. Grantaire didn’t know what to make of that, but accepted it. So he follows his friends to the meetings, at first only once a week but now twice a week. They have an internally published zine with the help of some of the students from Illustration (Grantaire secretly hates them), several blogs that are jointly run by Enjolras, Combeferre and Courfeyrac and soon, with Marius who is taking a dreadfully boring course in graphics and web-design, they will have their own, official website.

Grantaire finds the entire thing exhaustingly obnoxious. He never watches the news, a habit from his mother who is sick of seeing reports about missing children, paedophiles and rapists, he doesn't care about politics, an apathy inherited from his sour father who has spent much of his life ‘being done over’ by every single party that has ever come into power and he never bothers to engage in debates, since he is a boy with no brothers and five sisters. Grantaire knows that Enjolras hates his indifference with an unforgiving tenacity. Despite Grantaire’s apolitical stance on almost everything, he doesn't keep quiet. He will pipe up, always after having too much to drink, just to challenge Enjolras. He seems to live simply to poke holes in every argument, every counter and every passionate exclamation about anything. When he is in the same room as Enjolras, he is the arsonist in the firework factory. He treasures the way he can blow-torch Enjolras into a corner, make him twitch and end up with a forehead full of sweaty curls. It is Grantaire’s favourite thing to be the cause of that.

This time, at the meeting on Monday after his project proposal, he will have something to care about. Enjolras constantly labels him a waste of space and air because he _‘doesn't care about anything or anyone’_. Grantaire is able to laugh this off. He believes, despite his frequent journeys to and from places of utter wretchedness, that he is filled with quite enough love and care. He believes this to keep himself afloat, and he believes that these easily lost things have to be earnestly deserved.

Enjolras, in comparison with the buoyant hope for such gracious traits somewhere within, is simply a rock on a chain around Grantaire's neck. Grantaire keeps these particular musings to himself, but recounts to Jehan and Feuilly his desire to alarm Enjolras into realising that he is not such a slovenly, uncaring and ignorant waste of space as readily taken. In one hand, Jehan and Feuilly both carry wariness of the scorching temperament of Enjolras, and in the other hand a measured admiration. Despite his obvious effort to be a well-rounded example of good natured human attributes, Enjolras is so focused and fervent that he is often quite unfair, and infamously unkind to those who don't share his views.

For example, Feuilly has been in disagreement with Enjolras recently at the ABC meetings. The disagreements stem from the debates revolving around adoption, and having lived through the system himself, Feuilly rightfully deems himself to be in possession of an upper-hand. He knows that if he is there when Grantaire participates in such a discussion, Enjolras will back down from saying anything too acidic. It has not been missed that Enjolras has a strange reverence for Feuilly that no one really understands.

Jehan, unlike the majority, is simply more loyal to Grantaire than he is to Enjolras, and is as difficult and unpleasant as a cat trapped in a small space when he hears something he doesn't like said against a friend. Enjolras has been on the receiving end of Jehan’s terrible claws, figuratively and literally, and rarely challenges him at debates anymore.

A silliness comes over the trio as they each imagine the look on Enjolras’s face when Grantaire will reveal a sincere interest in the discussion at hand during the ABC meeting on Monday. Grantaire departs Jehan and Feuilly’s small flat after dinner on Sunday, feeling particularly light all the way home.

* * *

 

It is Monday and the ABC meeting is over. Grantaire sits, surrounded by the sketchbooks, mood boards and example books of the kind he had proposed to create in his presentation earlier that day. He stares at his pile of stuff in utter mortification and silence. Throughout the entire meeting Jehan and Feuilly kept looking at him, eyes widening, silently urging him to jump in and say something, but Grantaire could not. He has never come to a meeting before and actually heard something he cared about being discussed. Unexpectedly he was swallowed by a cold anxiety at the thought of joining in. His stance on the issue is premature and still entrenched in his inexpressible emotions, his heartache for the children with no parents. He hasn’t yet gathered enough information on the matter or thought about the journey he will have to make if he is to ever adopt a child of his own. He hasn’t felt the feelings long enough to extract anything decipherable from them. For the first time ever, he finds himself terrified by the prospect of Enjolras shooting him down.

‘Grantaire, what’s the matter? Why didn’t you speak up?’ Jehan has floated over to Grantaire’s side and is looking worried. Feuilly is there too, frowning over his crossed arms.

‘I know, I know – I just didn’t know what to say!’ He fusses at the tattered spine of his sketchbook with shaky fingers. ‘I’m not used to actually giving a crap about anything this group goes on about! Least of all talking to Enjolras about it!’

‘Talking to me about what?’

All three heads turn, Jehan and Grantaire are wide-eyed and Feuilly is guarded. Enjolras falters for a second at these reactions. Feuilly moves to leave the room, and as he sweeps by Enjolras, his mood still black from the nasty argument they'd had in the meeting, he says something in an emotionless monotone that neither Grantaire nor Jehan can hear. Enjolras looks at them before asking Jehan if he can speak to Grantaire alone. Jehan gives him a very pointed look before leaving the table, offering a reassuring squeeze to Grantaire's shoulder.

Grantaire watches with the feeling of a sinking cannon ball as Jehan slips outside. He can sense that Enjolras is staring hard at him and when he turns to finally look he sees the same thundery scowl and childish pout that greeted him the very first night he came to university. He sighs, slumps heavily in his chair.

‘So what do you want this time, thundercunt?’

Enjolras winces, he can be the delicate kind when it comes to such vulgarities. He sits stiffly across from Grantaire, regarding him with a cat-like scorn and hisses, _‘Don’t_ call me that.’

Grantaire’s lips twist and his ever-simmering loathing comes to the boil. ‘I’ll call you what I like. You’re a pig; I despise you more than the stupid clothes you wear.’

‘Fucking hell, Grantaire, don’t you ever need a rest from this?’

Grantaire chews the insides of his cheeks for a moment, swallowing countless fantasies of ugly and unforgivable language. He coaches his voice into bite-size chips of ice, ‘I just. Really. Don’t. Like you.’

Enjolras slams his fists, balls of sharp knuckles and veins, hard onto the table, sends an empty paper coffee cup bouncing to the floor. ‘But why? _Why?_ I don’t understand? Why have you always hated me?’

‘Because –’ Grantaire catches himself, remembering the terrible sting and the shame he had felt when he’d come face to face with Enjolras that long time ago in the packed student bar. He remembers how he felt, stuttering from inside the depths of a panic he had no control over in the face of someone who couldn’t have possibly realised what was actually happening. Grantaire clenches his fists, angry with himself and evermore hateful of Enjolras, just for existing to bring these feelings on him.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ he finishes. Enjolras’s face spasms, confused. ‘I just came here to – to say how I felt about the adoption thing. You know, ‘cause I want to adopt kids one day. I just thought maybe I could join in this time.’ He gathers then his books into his arms and departs and Enjolras lets him go, perplexed.

* * *

 

Although Enjolras and Grantaire have never had much reason to interact outside of the meetings, it is clear to all that they have been actively avoiding each other more devotedly than usual. They play an almost expert game of never being in the same room as each other, a twisted two-man relay race with no direction and no apparent finishing line.

As Friday rolls around, Grantaire is still moping about what happened at the meeting. He glumly accepts Jehan and Feuilly’s invitation to join them for pasta bake night again. He wanders the long way to their small accommodation, kicking at things on the floor and nearly stepping into traffic twice. He approaches their front door and extracts his phone from his pocket to check the time. He frowns, three missed calls from Jehan and one from Feuilly. His persistently heavy heart sinks much lower. They must have been trying to let him know that pasta bake night was off, or that they haven't made enough for him to share. He sighs, but since he is already there he decides to knock and wait.

‘Grantaire!’ Jehan answers the door very quickly and seems genuinely happy that Grantaire has arrived, but his smile falls a little. ‘I’ve been trying to ring you –’

‘I know, sorry.’ Grantaire has a quizzical frown. ‘I didn’t see until I checked the time just now.’

‘Well,’ sighs Jehan. ‘You’d better come in, then…’

The frown deepens on Grantaire’s face as he passes over the threshold into the warmth of the little home. He means to walk straight through to the kitchen, but he stops when he hears a voice that he would pay an inordinate amount of money to never hear again. The fervent tone of Enjolras carries through from the kitchen with the acquainted aroma of pasta bake. Grantaire can see Feuilly over Enjolras’s shoulder. When Enjolras notices that Feuilly was staring beyond him, he stops talking and turns.

Grantaire shifts from foot to foot, feeling awkward. When he sees not one but two pasta bakes on the kitchen counter beside Feuilly, who is still wearing an oven glove, he feels suspicious and betrayed. His eyes rove slowly up to look Enjolras in the face. He sees hard, shrewd eyes and a thin mouth. It is Feuilly who breaks the silence.

‘Enjolras came for pasta bake night, too.’

‘Why?’ Grantaire’s voice is a poison dart. ‘Is this a joke?’ He turns to leave, but Jehan is right behind him.

‘It was his idea,’ Jehan says, accusatory, gesturing at Enjolras. ‘He says he wants to talk to you.’

‘What could he possibly have to say to me?’

'I just wanted to know why you didn't join in the debate on Monday?' Enjolras holds his palm skywards, open for an answer to be laid down for him. 'Finally we're debating something you care about and you _don't_ join in?' What's the matter with you?'

Feuilly snorts at this, 'Yeah, that and he just wanted to fucking scrounge a free meal.'

Grantaire hears the teasing flavour of Feuilly's words and allows himself to give way to the shadow of a grin, but he sees that Enjolras, who is perhaps smothered by his puzzling admiration for Feuilly, can't seem to filter the definition of the words from the manner of the delivery. Enjolras looks around, his dark pebble eyes hurting as the eyes of the younger brother might hurt when he is teased by his elder sibling. Feuilly yields obvious irritation at this, tutting and whipping his kitchen cloth over his shoulder. Like the rest of the circle, he remains ignorant of the source of this awe that Enjolras carries like a banner in his presence.

'Don't look at me like that, you silly arse, I was just joking.' He slips both hands into his oven gloves and lifts the pasta bakes to bring to the coffee table in the small living room. 'Come on, they'll get cold.'

Jehan and Grantaire know their cues, one bringing a stack of bowls and the other some cutlery, well rehearsed from previous Pasta Bake Fridays all spent together, whilst Enjolras for once in his life hovers clumsily, not knowing what to do. He simply follows them into the living room. Feuilly is sitting in his armchair, Jehan on one side of the sofa, and despite there being a spare space on the sofa, Grantaire is happy to nestle cross-legged atop of a large cushion on the floor next to Jehan. Enjolras frowns, but supposes it would be acceptable to take the other side of the sofa, and so he does, his eyes flickering as Grantaire bristles like a nervous terrier on the floor beside him.

It is silent as Feuilly serves up the food. The bowls and items of cutlery don't match and Enjolras is handed an ugly dish that looks as if it might have been purloined from the tableware of a cheap Bed & Breakfast, along with a childish kind of fork that has a thick plastic handle, transparent with the impression of bubbles captured within. He tries not to let his nose wrinkle at this. Enjolras was raised in and now attempts to maintain a household with a distinct order in all its things, harmony and consistency reigning through an all-connecting web. Discord in his precise arrangements pluck nauseatingly at him, the way Combeferre never remembers to make sure the handles of the mugs all point the same way, or the way Joly mixes up the red placemats from the living area with the yellow ones in the kitchen. He cracks his knuckles when he thinks of it.

Grantaire mumbles around his food.

'What's that?' Feuilly has a small smile, a soft fondness as he looks down at Grantaire. Enjolras thinks it is a very ill-placed expression and tastes bitterness that Feuilly doesn't smile in a suchlike way at him when he speaks. He pecks savagely at the food in his bowl with his fork.

'I said it's really good, it always is!'

Feuilly laughs. 'It's the _same_ as it always is, Grantaire.'

'Yeah but it's good.'

Jehan nods his agreement. 'It's better than what I normally eat. I'm starting to forget what kinds of food exist aside from cornflakes and noodles.'

Enjolras hums an understanding at this, dipping his head as he rolls the pasta around his mouth. Grantaire's mighty locks bounce as his head spins about to jab a needle-like gaze into Enjolras. His eyes are horridly suspicious and once again poison darts come from his mouth.

'You taking the piss again? What does a spoilt brat like you know about living off pennies?'

Enjolras nearly lets his food fall out of his mouth.

'Excuse me?'

'The fuck do you even know? Everyone knows you've got fucking rich parents, don't you insult the rest of us by pretending you know what it's like to live off one meal a day, or to not even know if you can feed yourself all the way through to your next payday.'

Grantaire closes his tirade with an incoherent huff, refocusing his not yet dissipated rage onto his near finished meal. Enjolras stares at him, appalled and maddened all at once. It is quite true that his parents are well-off, and this fact has always been a pitchfork prodding at him through his university life. One prong dictates that he would be rewarded for declining assistance from his parents, a sort of commitment to ride through the same pains as his less than financially comfortable friends, the other prong would bring a puzzling contrast of resentment for refusing to make use of this very same money. Others would say, 'If only I could get money like that from my parents.'

Enjolras grinds his words through his teeth. 'My parents are well-off. I am not.' Grantaire is clearly listening, committed to murdering each fusilli twirl in his bowl with his fork as Enjolras speaks. 'Don't _you_ insult _me_ by pretending you know what you're talking about.'

Feuilly then abruptly and none too gently places his empty bowl on the coffee table and unfolds swiftly from his armchair to stand.

'Jehan and I are going to the corner shop.'

'We are?'

Feuilly snatches his coat, a nondescript item, and slouches it on, then throws Jehan's jacket, a flamboyant pink and green disaster, across the room. 'Yes,' he finally says. 'To get something for pudding. We'll be back in half an hour.'

Jehan tilts his head. He jumps up to join Feuilly who is already beyond the threshold, waiting in the street. As he struggles to get his arms into his jacket he looks to Enjolras and Grantaire with a wicked grin. 'Feuilly is quite the conspirator, isn't he?' Two frowns meet him, the confused inclination of two curly heads. Jehan tuts. 'It's nearly the end of our second year, guys.' His pale green eyes look purposefully, if not disappointedly, between the pair before him. 'We're giving you space to talk... at least I think that's what we're doing. Sort yourselves out. There won't be time for your drama in the final year.'

Then Jehan is gone, the door latch clicking with dreadful finality. Silence lounges in the house, spreading itself out for as long as possible before its presence becomes too awkward to remain welcome. Enjolras scrapes his fork around his bowl. 'I still have a scar, you know.'

Grantaire moves a little, acknowledging Enjolras to show that he is listening, though not respecting him enough to face him properly, and snaps, 'What.' It is not questioning, only demanding.

'My scar. Where you stubbed your fucking cigarette out on me.'

Then Grantaire winces and eventually does turn around to look at Enjolras. His eyes climb up to confirm what has been said, and sure enough there is a scar, a faded blotch of deep pink on the left cheekbone. He doesn't say anything, letting his eyes fall, ashamed and unable to look Enjolras in the eye.

'You never said sorry.' Enjolras picks a chip in the rim of his bowl with his fingernail. 'And you never told me why you were like that. Why you did that.'

'It will sound stupid now. It was a long time ago.'

'I'm sure it would have sounded stupid even if you had explained yourself at the time.'

Grantaire hisses, leaving his cushion on the floor to collect the empty bowls and disappear into the kitchen. Enjolras splutters angrily and follows him.

'Just tell me!' he snaps. 'Just say! It won't make me hate you any less but at least I'd understand you a bit better -'

Grantaire frightens himself for the first time in a long time, and seems to frighten Enjolras too, because he flinches and looks shocked at the sound of the stack of bowls crashing purposefully onto the kitchen floor. Grantaire has launched them in a flash-fit of rage, chips of porcelain and flecks of sauce and pasta spread out all around them. He's panting through his nose and his eyebrows are trembling. He deflates and puts his hands over his face, breathing sharply with his mouth.

'I'm tired,' he gasps between his hands. He might be sobbing, but there aren't any tears, just pangs of overwhelming emotion. 'I'm so fucking tired.'

Enjolras hasn't moved and hasn't said anything. It feels like hours before Grantaire hears him fish his phone from his pocket, hears the _tok-tok-tok_ of his touch screen as he sends a text message. The tears have come now, and as the surge of furious energy and subsequent shock ebbs, Grantaire begins to shake all over, every spasm leeching something more from him. The sharp breathing ends and he dares to lower his hands and look at what he's done.

'I broke the bowls,' he says pathetically.

'You broke the bowls,' Enjolras softly echoes.

They seem to stand for a few hours more. Grantaire asks who Enjolras was texting.

'I texted Feuilly to say we had an accident with the bowls and that we're sorry and we're gonna go buy some more for them. Like now.'

Grantaire stares dumbly, wondering how he looks since his head feels so tight and his eyes so blurry from the crying. 'We're gonna get more bowls?'

'Yeah. Supermarket isn't that far.'

Enjolras pulls his jacket on and Grantaire copies him, sniffing and wiping his face. Although he knows the way to the large 24-hour supermarket he finds himself simply shadowing Enjolras, no attention paid to surroundings, musing that this was the first time he had ever followed him, not in an attempt to pester him or finish off an argument, but to merely end up in the same place as him. To be with him.

They arrive. Anyone who lives on this side of the town could probably find their way around the supermarket in a blindfold, but still Grantaire does not make the effort, close upon the heels of Enjolras's boots, looking nowhere else. He is beginning to feel a bit embarrassed by himself. Soon Enjolras has directed them to the home and kitchenwares part of the large store, and stares intensely at what there is to choose from. Grantaire comes to life a little and realises something that makes him feel even more embarrassed.

'I don't carry cash,' he whispers. Enjolras looks at him. 'And my bank card is back at theirs. In my wallet in my bag.' Enjolras looks at him a while longer, a bizarre calculating arrangement on his features. Grantaire is aware of how his dark grey eyes flicker all over his face, taking in every naked item of evidence of his pain and stupidity. Then he just shrugs and goes back to looking at the kitchenwares and prices. Grantaire blinks.

They search for a short while, but Grantaire feels that he can't make a choice because it's apparent that Enjolras has decided to pay for new bowls, even though it wasn't he that broke the old ones. Grantaire imagines that he might feel guilty for causing him to get so upset that he smashed them in the first place, a hopeful little spark that may not be entirely untrue. Although he isn't talking to Grantaire or even looking at him, Enjolras exudes a patient energy until he finally crouches and picks up a boxed selection of crockery. Grantaire stares at him.

'I only broke the bowls. That's an entire set. It's got plates and stuff.'

Enjorlas stares back as if he can't understand the point of what Grantaire said. 'It matches. You have to have matching crockery.'

His face stays stuck on the expression Grantaire thinks he'd probably use if he ever met someone who didn't know the difference between a cow and a donkey, and being so utterly spent after his fit, he can't find it in himself to argue. So he bends down and picks up another set, same contents, but with a different pattern on the porcelain. Enjolras looks at his, lovely, simple and white, then at what Grantaire has in his hands, soft cream with gentle orange polka dots around the rims. He thinks the set looks ugly, and pulls a face at Grantaire, who smirks back at him.

'Feuilly likes orange. And Jehan has a thing about polka dots.'

Enjolras still thinks it's an ugly set, but he does that funny shrug again and puts the plain white set back. His pocket chimes. A substantial text from Feuilly, by his standards anyway, which he reads before passing the phone over for Grantaire to read.

_dude. just got back. wtf. gimme a_

_text when you are on your way back. me_

_and jehan got apple crumble and custard_

_for pudding. hurry fuck up before he eats it all_ _x_

The phone buzzes and chimes again.

_PS could have at least fucking tidied up_

_before you left you silly knobs_ _x_

Grantaire smiles at the way Feuilly texts Enjolras, a much easier manner than he might use with others. He wonders if Feuilly's usual text-voice has upset Enjolras in the past, and has since had to coach his tone a little.

'Let's pay for this then,' says Enjolras as he takes his phone back. He walks to the self-service tills, letting Grantaire carry the crockery and scan it through. Grantaire goes a little wide-eyed when the price flashes up on the PIN pad, remembering the spat about finances they'd had before he smashed the bowls. Maybe Enjolras is using money he's not supposed to really use. The thought makes Grantaire feel a little bad.

Soon they have arrived back at Jehan and Feuilly's place, where the evidence of the fit has been cleared up. Feuilly looks intently at Grantaire's face, but it seems that he won't broach the subject of puffy eyes unless someone else does first, which they don't. Jehan does that thing where he glides effortlessly over the situation and smooths it down it with his happy manner, proudly announcing that _this_ time he hasn't burnt the custard in the microwave, and then gets horrifically excited by the crockery set that Enjolras pulls out of the shopping bag.

'I _love_ polka dots!' he exclaims.

'Did you break more than our bowls, then?' says Feuilly.

'No,' Enjolras says truthfully. Then he lies, 'This was the only set with polka dots. We thought only polka dots would do.'

Grantaire can't tell what Feuilly makes of that and Jehan absolutely doesn't care as he dishes crumble and custard into the new bowls. When everyone has been served they all traipse back into the living room to sit and eat. Feuilly as always has the armchair, but Jehan is the one who takes the large cushion on the floor. Again the telly is on for a comfortable soundtrack, beyond the big back window a rosy dusk looks in through veils of thrumming drizzle and once more there is a first time for both Grantaire and Enjolras; the conversation comes easily.

 


End file.
